Interrupting the Familiar

San Antonio isn’t known as one of the world’s top cities for art. But, says Laurie Britton Newell, guest curator of the Contemporary Art Month (CAM) Perennial Exhibition, it doesn’t have to be.

While in past decades, major art movements revolved around the scene in places like New York, Paris and London, Britton Newell says the art world now is beginning to de-centralize, leaving more opportunities for growth and innovation in cities like San Antonio, Denver or even Mumbai, India. “There really is a shift going away from the three or five main cities around the world that are traditionally art centers,” says Britton Newell, a Colorado resident and U.K. native. The Perennial Exhibition she’s curating, Errant Domestic, opens March 11 and will feature the work of six San Antonio artists. (The location was to be determined at press time after the Guadalupe Cultural Arts Center withdrew itself as host, citing the lack of Latina artists represented.)

An outside perspective on San Antonio art is exactly what CAM organizers look for when inviting a guest curator (past curators have come from Mexico City, Houston, New Orleans and other places). Britton Newell spent a decade as a curator at the Victoria and Albert Museum in London before moving to the U.S., where she teaches at the University of Colorado and curates independently. She’d never been to Texas before working on the CAM Perennial Exhibition and says she found a big city with a small-town feel in San Antonio. “It’s always really fascinating to view a city through the eyes of its local artists,” she says. “San Antonio—I got the sense that it’s neighborhood-based and there are many small communities within the city. It seemed also to be an affordable place to live and get yourself established and those things certainly contribute to a thriving art scene.”

For most new art graduates, Britton Newell says, just learning how to break into the art world—let alone make a true name for yourself—can be a challenge. Because San Antonio is affordable, it’s a place where artists can study art and then stay while they launch a career. “There’s also obviously a rich kind of cultural diversity that’s underpinning what’s possible in San Antonio,” she says.

The six artists featured in Errant Domestic have all done that, either starting a career in the Alamo City or finding their place here after first working elsewhere. Each of the artists included produces work that adds an element of unfamiliar to a commonplace object or scene. Jennifer Ling Datchuk, for example, utilizes domestic objects like plates to create art. But along with porcelain, she also relies on human hair to accentuate her pieces. Leigh Anne Lester, in contrast, focuses much of her work on plants. But, rather than depicting typical flora and fauna, she looks at what happens when the natural growing process is disrupted by hybridization. “They’re all united in this idea of a disruption to (nature or domestic space)—a change in the natural order of things,” says Britton Newell. The exhibition runs through March and is part of the citywide CAM celebration that includes dozens of exhibits and events. “San Antonio is really at the forefront in having a dedicated month and in collaborating with other curators,” Britton Newell says.